Does anyone else ever wonder if Chiari is really as rare as we're being made to believe? I don't know about the rest of you, but I run across people all the time who either have it or are close to someone who does (family member, close friend). Not just on Chiari forums, too! They might not know the name of it, but when they describe it, I recognize it right away.

I'm wondering, also about this intriguing theory regarding autism and Chiari. My 13 yo son has both, and I am continually running across parents of kids who also do, or I strongly suspect they do, based on account on symptoms. I have hydrocephalus myself (congenital, dx'ed in infancy), and all my life, until very recently (last 5 years or so), I have heard it described as "rare," even by those who should know better. Is it possible that Chiari is in a similar category? Anyone have any thoughts on this? How about the Chiari-autism connection? I really believe there is one, and there was an eye-opening talk given at a recent conference that spent a fair amount of time on this:

http://hosted.mediasite.com/hosted4/...playerType=WM7 The last dozen minutes or so focus specifically on this. The presentation itself is about 35 min long, so if the last portion is of special interest to you, as it is to me, you can fast forward to about 20:30 and listen to that part of the talk.

LIZARD, curious about your thoughts